City's Potential Litter 'Fees' For Chewing Gum a Bitter 'I Told You So' Moment
Fri., Feb. 5 2010 @ 11:11AM
| San Francisco's new Public Enemies, Nos. 1 and 2 |
This comes on the heels of last year's dubious 20-cent fee on cigarettes for ostensibly the same reason. And while we don't claim to be Carnac the Magnificent, it warrants mentioning that SF Weekly pointed out that Newsom's logic in dinging cigarette smokers could easily be rolled out to target gum-chewers, candy bar-eaters, or any other group purchasing any product under the sun. There really is no end in sight. As we wrote at the time:
...If Newsom's logic were practiced fairly and across the board, then virtually any product could be hit with this kind of fee to justify its later removal. How about chewing gum, the product that often comes out No. 1 on city litter surveys? A new surcharge would bring new meaning to the term "Double your pleasure." How about cans and bottles of juice and soda? You bet. That goes doubly for cans and bottles of beer and booze -- not only are the receptacles left around the city, we're stuck power-washing the resultant urine out of vast swaths of San Francisco. ...





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